Ex-cop Reluctantly Set To Part With His Capone Treasures

`Scarface' Chronicled In Stained Glass

November 24, 1996|By John O'Brien, Tribune Staff Writer.

Until he began going to church to do more than worship, Michael Prokop was known best among his family and friends for two reasons: his 28-year career as a Chicago police officer and his ambitious rendering of Roaring '20s gangster Al Capone in stained glass.

Now there is a third reason: his equally appealing work with stained glass church windows.

Prokop, a history buff retired from police work, sees no inconsistency in his selection of topics. Art is art, he says, be it reflective of crime or of goodness, and the light shines through both saints and sinners in his stained glass works.

A longtime student of Chicago during Prohibition, the muralist acknowledges a particular fascination for that time when liquor and beer were outlawed--and outlaws like Capone flourished--during the "dry years" from 1919 to 1932.

"It was a time when a lot of people did a lot of bad and a lot of good," he observed. "It was a time of struggle for many." But now is a time of struggle for Prokop, the cop and Capone artist.

And he's willing to part with his personal pieces of Prohibition history if someone meets his price.

At age 56 and afflicted with cancer, Prokop is gaining recognition for his artistic skill in the making of intricate stained glass murals that depict ancient Christian symbols and figures.

"He is doing an excellent job. His is an unbelievable work," beamed Rev. Anargyros Stavropoulos, the recipient of Prokop's talents and pastor of St. Spyridon Hellenic Orthodox Church in Palos Heights.

It is there--in no fewer than 70 windows and apertures of the church--that the ill muralist's stained glass work is visible in a panoply of shapes and colors.

"I made the original design, and Mr. Prokop took it from there," Stavropoulos explained. "The windows are his best effort."

The artist spoke recently of his church work and the Capone mural, which he has reluctantly put up for sale.

Six years in the planning and execution, the gangster mural is the sum of 4,000 pieces of glass, each specially tinted, then cut and fitted into three individual layers. The panel is 7 1/2 feet tall and 5 1/2 feet wide.

Prokop is also seeking a buyer for several Capone artifacts he acquired in 1992 from the Leslie Hindeman Auction House in Chicago.

Money is needed, the former lawman explained, to offset mounting medical bills for himself and to retire a mortgage on his home in Green Garden Township in Will County.

Once housed on the property of Capone's winter home on Palm Island, Fla., where the former crime boss died in 1947, the memorabilia includes letters of authentication and includes a sterling silver hand juicer and a set of six cordial glasses.

Also available are two pieces of ornate furniture--a cream colored dresser fitted with small drawers and cabinets and a Louis XIV bureau or commode with a marble top.

Prokop hopes to sell it all to a single buyer.

"I am looking for an offer I can't refuse," he smiles.

His wife, anxious to help, sometimes shows the Capone possessions to visitors.

"Everything," Dolores Prokop allows in a moment of quiet reflection, "is coming down on us now."

Michael Prokop was diagnosed with lung cancer in March, one year after retiring from the Chicago Police Department.

In addition to the mortgage, his life insurance has lapsed, and he is counting on a brisk trade in the Capone-related artifacts to see his family through financial hardship.

Trade in Capone artifacts is usually active in the world of American collecting and is even international in scope.

"There is a flourishing group of collectors of police and crime memorabilia, and it's worldwide," according to John Binder, president of Chicago's Merry Gangsters Literary Society. "What is of particular interest to them is anything Capone and (1930s bank robber John) Dillinger, and I think Dillinger is probably second."

Such fascination, Binder said, exists well beyond this country to Europeans and Asians.

Nearly 50 years after his death, "Scarface" Capone may come to the aid of a Chicago law enforcement officer, not part of his historical reputation but an ironic twist to the Chicago gangster's legend.